


Heir

by redcandle17



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - Martin
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-04
Updated: 2010-01-04
Packaged: 2017-10-05 19:06:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/45104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redcandle17/pseuds/redcandle17
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>He wonders whether he's being wise or selfish.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Heir

Jon can scarcely believe a word the little crannogman is saying. Howland Reed was his father's most trusted friend; that's the only reason Jon doesn't call his guards and have them escort him out.

"It's true, Jon. I swear it on the old gods. I'll swear it again in the godswood if you wish."

There is a grove of weirdwood trees not far from the Wall where he'd sworn his oath. The grove might be not be far in terms of distance, but it's on the other side of the Wall and that's too far now. It doesn't matter anyway. Jon has seen men lie in the sept, has seen them make vows on the honor of their mothers and then broken those vows. It doesn't matter if Howland Reed repeats his strange story here in Jon's chambers or before the old gods.

Part of him wants to believe the story, wants to believe it for Ned Stark's sake. He's willing to believe that his father isn't his father if it means that Lord Eddard never dishonored himself. But it leaves him fatherless as well as motherless. Rhaegar Targaryen died before Jon was born, and if Reed is to be believed, Lyanna Stark died giving birth to him. He knows nothing of Lyanna, only that she was beautiful and spirited and talk of her made his father – made Ned Stark sad. Of Rhaegar he knows even less, only what the singers saw fit to put to song.

"So I am a Targaryen bastard, not a Stark one. Why did you tell me this?"

That's when Reed tells him the rest. Jon has to laugh. There had been times when he was little when he'd pretend that his father secretly wed his mother and he was trueborn and the real heir to Winterfell. "Jon Targaryen," he murmurs. If things had gone differently, he would have been a prince or even king. But a throne he's never even seen doesn't matter when there are wildings on this side of the Wall and a host of dead men and worse on the other side.

~

Daenerys is married to two other men and Jon has promised himself that he would never break his oath again. Yet the dragon queen is in his bed. Again. Her hands are splayed on his chest as she rides him. Jon could touch her, could twist the pale tips of her small breasts between his fingertips, but he is content to just watch her. Men say she is the most beautiful woman in the world and at the moment he would have to concur.

She is his aunt if Howland Reed is to be believed. Yet Jon had never seen or heard of her before the past moon. She is a stranger to him; it does not feel like incest. He reacts to her as he would react to any beautiful woman who made it clear that she desired him; not that there have been many of those.

"Do blue roses grow here?"

Jon had almost been asleep and the question startles him. "It's winter, Your Grace. Nothing grows here now." He can fuck the queen but he can't address her as "Dany" as she'd told him he could call her. "Dany" sounds like a girl with whom he could walk hand in hand at a village market, not a woman who'd descended from the sky on the back of a dragon.

Daenerys yawns and cuddles closer to him. Her skin is more than warm, it's _hot_. The first time he touched her, he'd worried that she had a fever. He's gotten used to the heat that radiates from her, but he still doesn't like it. He is a Stark no matter what other blood flows in his veins and Starks are creatures of the cold. He shifts slightly away from her and thinks of playing in summer snowfalls as a child. But the last summer snow had been on the day he left Winterfell and it hurts to think of Robb standing there with snow melting in his auburn hair so Jon kisses Daenerys to distract himself.

"When spring comes, I'll pick roses for you myself." If spring ever comes. If they're still alive. If she has not lost interest in him.

"I'd like that." She looks younger when she smiles and he remembers that she's younger than him. "But that's not why I asked. I had a vision of a blue rose growing from a wall of ice. I know what the other visions meant now but that one is still a mystery. Ser Barristan said my brother Rhaegar gave your aunt Lyanna a crown made of blue roses the day he won the great tourney at Harrenhal but I don't see what that has to do with anything."

There will never be a better time to tell her how they are truly linked yet Jon holds his tongue. What if Daenerys decides he is a threat to her throne? Worse, what if she wants to take him as her consort? He may be breaking his vows, but he won't abandon them altogether and it's best to avoid temptation.

~

After a decade the whole realm knows that the queen is barren. It will mean war when she dies. Daenerys is still a young woman so it won't happen soon but it will happen. She will die and the great lords will bleed the realm until one of them seizes the Iron Throne. People remember the War of the Five Kings and it leeches at their hope for what should be a glorious new era. Why build when some knight will burn your home? How long before your sons are marched away in some lord's host?

Jon swore to protect the realm. He could stay here at the Wall and stand guard against a defeated enemy. Or he could give the realm hope and peace. As he ties his letter to the leg of a raven, he wonders whether he's being wise or selfish. Perhaps both.

She takes him into her bed the night he reaches King's Landing. In the morning he is decreed to be the legitimate son of Rhaegar Targaryen and in the afternoon he is confirmed Prince of Dragonstone and heir to the Seven Kingdoms and the Small Council begins to discuss which great lord's daughter will be the most suitable bride. He is her heir and that means he must have heirs of his own. It seems that the gods do not mean for Jon to ever have anything he truly wants.


End file.
